


So It Was Arranged

by YamiSnuffles



Series: Too Much of a Good Thing [8]
Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Both Angels, Alternate Universe - Crowley Didn't Fall (Good Omens), Discorporation (Good Omens), M/M, Mild Hurt/Comfort, The Arrangement (Good Omens)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-29
Updated: 2020-05-29
Packaged: 2021-03-03 02:01:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,579
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24447031
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/YamiSnuffles/pseuds/YamiSnuffles
Summary: Aziraphale wrung his hands and found it didn’t quite have the same soothing effect without his corporation. He could feel the ghost of hot tears on his face. He reached up to touch them but there was nothing there. They’d been left back on Earth, along with the skin they’d fallen upon and the muscle, fat, blood, and bone beneath. They’d been left with Crowley.He had to get back.
Relationships: Aziraphale/Crowley (Good Omens)
Series: Too Much of a Good Thing [8]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1527806
Comments: 25
Kudos: 91





	So It Was Arranged

1066 AD

Aziraphale wondered if humans would ever get tired of fighting. He certainly had, back when humans had only been a sparkle in divine eyes. He vividly remembered thinking, at the very least, the fight with the Fallen would be the last. The Fallen had been dealt with, only the faithful remained in Heaven, and that was that. Even having lived through that, when he was assigned to guard Eden, he hadn’t suspected there would be trouble. It was a fresh start. She had done so much work to make a world for the humans, he couldn’t imagine She would let anything happen to them let alone that Heaven would  _ want  _ fighting.

“What’s this have to do with anything?”

Aziraphale stumbled. He really wasn’t feeling well at all. Too much fighting for too long. He couldn’t quite remember when he’d last stopped. He had stopped at some point, hadn’t he? He was almost certain.

“Aziraphale!”

Aziraphale shook his head. He was hearing things. He would have to add that to the list of problems, along with some sort of problem with his vision and difficulty concentrating.

“Aziraphale, hey, talk to me. Come on.”

There were hands on his shoulders. Aziraphale stared at them until he realized that hands were attached to arms, which were, generally speaking, usually attached to people. His gaze wandered vaguely from delicate hands to bony wrist, on to wiry arms, pointed shoulders, long neck, and finally a face.

“Oh, Crowley. Hello. What are you doing here? You’re not supposed to be here, are you? Yes. Yes, I definitely remember that much.” Aziraphale’s eyes travelled beyond that beloved face, with its startling golden eyes and crooked nose, to something bright and white and nearly blinding. “You have your wings out? Why have you got your wings out.”

“Why have I— I’m getting you out of here, that’s why.”

“I’m supposed to be here, though. I don’t think I should go anywhere.” Aziraphale’s legs felt shaky and his stomach turned at the prospect of flying. Yes, a quick nap seemed just the ticket. “I think I’d rather stay here and lay down for a moment, my dear.”

His legs gave out but rather than meet with the ground, he found himself in Crowley’s arms. What beloved arms. Thin but willow strong like all of Crowley, so much less likely to snap than Aziraphale.

“No, no, no. Keep your eyes open. Do not close them. Don’t you dare.”

Aziraphale reached out. Crowley’s eyes seemed strange. Watery. He collected a drop on his gloved finger and blinked at it. “Are you… crying? Why are you crying?”

“Because you’re dying, you big idiot. So focus and stay here while I heal you. Fuck, you’ve lost so much blood. It will take me time so  _ stay with me _ .”

Crowley’s words seemed like they should be angry but they sounded so sad. Aziraphale didn’t understand it. It was only a nap. That wasn’t anything to worry about. Crowley slept all the time. Really, he was being unreasonable.

“Just a small nap,” he mumbled, “and I’ll be right as rain, dearest. So please don’t cry.”

“Don’t. Don’t leave me here.  _ Please _ . I can’t follow you there.”

Crowley’s voice cracked and something in Aziraphale cracked with it but he could no longer keep his eyes open no matter how he tried. There was a light, bright and warm and irresistible. He needn’t even move toward it. It was the ensnaring drag of the tide and he was far too tired to struggle against the pull. He was going home. He was released from his body with a sigh that he hoped sounded something like  _ good-bye _ or, perhaps,  _ I’m sorry _ .

Aziraphale returned to consciousness in a place that was about as far as anyone could get from the mess of blood and bodies he’d left behind. Mud and clouds and the stench of war had been replaced by sterile, dazzling white in all directions. The heat of his gambeson and chainmail were gone. An overwhelming sense of peace had overtaken any physical discomfort because there was nothing physical left about him. 

Free of his wounded corporation, he could remember it all. He remembered losing his footing in the muck when he’d tried to avoid being struck in the head. The heavy clubbed end of a mace had hit him before he could bring up his shield to block it. Five millennia on Earth and with the experience of fighting against the damned and yet all it had taken was one misstep and one foolish clump of metal to bring it all to an end. His life had already been forfeit before Crowley had found him.

“Oh, Crowley.”

Aziraphale wrung his hands and found it didn’t quite have the same soothing effect without his corporation. He could feel the ghost of hot tears on his face. He reached up to touch them but there was nothing there. They’d been left back on Earth, along with the skin they’d fallen upon and the muscle, fat, blood, and bone beneath. They’d been left with Crowley.

He needed to get back, which meant he needed a new corporation. He knew that there was someone in charge of such things but he’d been assigned his original one so long ago that he didn’t rightly remember who. He was quite certain everything had looked different then. He was in some sort of small reception room with a sign that said, “Welcome Back” on the wall. He supposed that should have been some sort of comfort to him. He was back in Heaven. It should have felt like home. Only, his home had a growing collection of books and a garden out back. It smelled of fresh baked bread, aging paper, and apple blossoms, not some vaguely ambrosial nothing. Most importantly, his home had the only angel not currently welcome here.

Aziraphale exited into a hallway full of identical doors. He wondered if the rooms behind them all hosted the newly discorporated. He hoped that meant there was a smooth reincorporation process set up. He needed to get back as soon as he could. He couldn’t very well do his job like this. Surely they would understand that.

He hurried down the hall until it let out into a large round room with a desk in the middle. A very bored looking angel was seated behind a thick ledger.

Aziraphale cleared his throat and the angel looked up at him. “Yes. Hello.” He gave a small wave and then tucked his hand behind his back when the gesture wasn’t returned. “I was hoping you might be able to tell me where to go to get a new body.”

The angel opened her mouth to respond but she was interrupted by a pop. A letter materialized on top of the ledger. Aziraphale waited as patiently as he could while she slowly unfurled the scroll and read its contents.

“Principality Aziraphale, you are expected up top immediately.”

Aziraphale shrank under the implications. “Up… up top?” he asked, pointing up. “The very top?”

The angel rolled her eyes at him. “No one goes all the way up. Not these days. You know that.”

“Y-yes. Of course. So, ah…”

“Archangel level, Principality.”

“Right.” It was a less daunting prospect than being summoned to speak directly with Her but standing before the Archangels always made something in his stomach twist, even when he didn’t rightly have a stomach to speak of. “I’ll be right on that. About my body, though…”

“Immediately, Principality.”

“Right.” Aziraphale’s shoulders slumped. He looked around but none of the doors were marked. “Excuse me, but it’s been a while. I just go—” The angel sighed and pointed to her right. Aziraphale offered a smile. “Thank you. I’ll be off then.”

The angel had already returned to filling in her ledger so Aziraphale hurried toward the indicated door. Beyond it was a spiral stone staircase that seemed to travel both up and down into eternity. He knew, logically, that he wouldn’t tire without his body to burden him but he felt exhausted simply looking at it.

By the time he got to the correct level he’d managed to forget who was waiting for him at the other end of it all. Uriel, Michael, and Gabriel were standing next to the tall, arched windows that looked out at the kingdoms of the world. They were busy talking amongst themselves and didn’t seem to have even noticed Aziraphale. As much as he wanted to get on to the business of getting his body back, he really wasn’t in a rush to draw attention to himself. Instead he shuffled up to one of the windows.

He hadn’t looked down on Earth from Heaven since the early days of creation. He recalled marvelling at how he could see every corner of that small blue planet at once, if he wanted, from the deep, dark home of the leviathan to lush nascent Eden. Now he felt as though he couldn’t see anything at all. All of humanity was reduced to a vague impression of their movements. They were nothing more than religion, expansion, progress, and regress. Looking at things this way, Aziraphale could almost see the broad strokes of the Great Plan but he couldn’t see the individual lives that would drive that plan to its inevitable conclusion. Perhaps if he focused in on one amongst the many, he could see. If he thought of scarlet ringlets and golden eyes, of long, lithe limbs and sharp angles…

“There you Aziraphale.”

Aziraphale yelped. Gabriel was standing right next to him, with the others not far behind. “Hello, Gabriel. And, ah, Michael and Uriel.” He had to remind himself that he’d been asked to come here. There was no reason to feel like he’d been caught sneaking where he didn’t belong. “You— you wanted to see me?”

“Well done in the battle,” Michael said. “You were able to advance things as planned.”

“Tough luck getting discorporated though. Taken down by  _ humans _ . Oof. That’s got to be embarrassing,” Gabriel added.

“There was mud,” Aziraphale quickly explained. “And that armor gets so hot. I had sweat in my eye.”

Gabriel slapped Aziraphale on the back and gave him his most tooth filled smile. “You’ll get ‘em next time, I’m sure, buddy. We’re not judging you for it, are we, Uriel?”

“No,” Uriel replied while somehow making that solitary syllable sound very much like a yes.

Aziraphale glanced between all three faces. He was never sure where he was supposed to look in situations such as these. “About— about next time. I was hoping I might get back. Only, I’ll need a body. Soon, preferably.”

Gabriel’s lavender eyes widened. “Go back? Why would you want to do that? You’ve put in your work. No one is expecting you to continue mucking about down there. That’s why I called you up here, to go over your next assignment.”

“S-stay here?” Cold dread washed over Aziraphale. “I couldn’t possibly. I have to go back. You know, to see things through properly. I wouldn’t want to see a job half done, after all.”

Uriel’s mouth actually twitched into the start of a bland smile. “An admirable attitude.”

Michael nodded. “Indeed.”

Gabriel scratched the back of his neck. “Well, alright then. If you’re really sure.”

“Quite.” Aziraphale wished he could tell what they were thinking. No matter their expressions, he always felt he was doing or saying the wrong thing. A smile never seemed exactly like a smile on the face of an Archangel. “That is, if it’s alright with all of you.”

“Sure thing,” Gabriel replied but before relief could take hold he added, “but getting you back down there isn’t exactly on the top of the list. You understand. And besides, you have your millennial report to get in still and the proper body requisition forms to fill out.”

Aziraphale forced a brave face to cover the slump of his shoulders. “Yes. Of course. I’ll get right on that.”

The Archangels had already gone back to talking amongst themselves and Aziraphale wondered why it had even been necessary to drag him up here in the first place. His impulse was still to bid them well before he went but he bit his tongue instead. Probably they would think he was bothering them and maybe they would be right, so he left without another word.

Matters did not improve from there. The angels down in the corporation department couldn’t give him a timeframe for when he might expect to get a new body and they didn’t see the rush. Worse, Aziraphale found it difficult to keep track of time in Heaven. Every moment seemed in itself an eternity and yet he also worried it was rushing by. He worried that while he was wading through paperwork, months were slipping by on Earth. He had to hope that, no matter the case, Crowley knew he hadn’t been abandoned.

He had no idea how long it took to slog through his report on the last millennium. What he did know is that he still didn’t have a body to call his own when it was over nor did he have any idea what to do with himself while he waited. He was a Principality. What was he supposed to do without humans about? Well, live ones, at any rate.

He missed the world. He missed the people and places. He longed for his favorite meals and new things to read. More than anything, he desperately, wrenchingly missed Crowley. Even when they’d been parted on Earth, it had never felt like this. There had always been a sense of him. All Aziraphale had needed to do was reach out and he could feel Crowley out there. And now, nothing. The gulf between them was too wide. Aziraphale felt the loss more keenly than the loss of his body. It was as though a piece of his very essence had been carved away.

That was how he found himself in the largely defunct department for the development and creation of celestial bodies. There had to be someone still working there because the office still existed but Aziraphale didn’t see any sign of anyone. There were drafting tables and desks spread throughout but most of them were barren. One desk had the nameplate Reuel on it and a note that said they were off to keep an eye on a potentially troublesome blackhole. Another, in a far corner, bore a familiar name, if one he hadn’t heard since the Beginning.

Aziraphale approached it as though afraid he might startle it if he walked in too direct a line. He picked up the nameplate and ran his thumb over the indented forms of an orphaned name. He put it back where it had been, careful that it was exactly as it had been, and took a seat. “I probably shouldn’t.” The desk drawers didn’t answer. Aziraphale reached out, pulled his hand back, and reached out again. “Well, I’m sure a quick look wouldn’t hurt anything. It’s not as though I’ll be interrupting his work and I certainly don’t have anything better to do with myself at the moment.”

Despite its long abandonment, Crowley’s desk was the picture of organization. Everything had a label, everything had a place. There were files for completed projects as well as rejected proposals and abandoned drafts. Every star, nebula, planet, and meteor he’d helped craft was carefully catalogued with a hand rendered picture and note from Crowley. Aziraphale wished he had a body to contain the way it made him feel to see Crowley’s literal signature on the stars. As it was, it was too expansive. He worried he might lose himself completely if he dwelled on it for too long.

He wanted to see them all the way that Crowley had. He remembered endless nights spent under an even more endless canopy of stars. They’d promised to go together to see them up close, as soon as Crowley was able. He could go on his own now. It would be as simple as walking out the door. From this department, he could go directly to any star system or heavenly body he so desired. But he didn’t want to, not without Crowley. Heaven would surely relent someday and they could fly to the stars together.

Aziraphale felt a pang where his heart would be if he currently had one. Coming here had not been the balm he’d hoped. He took one last wistful look through a stack of delicately rendered nebulae and filed them back where he’d found them. As he did, his hand bumped the back of the drawer.

“What’s this?”

He pulled the drawer out as far as it would go and palmed at the back panel, which had given a hollow knock when he’d bumped it. The panel gave way. A good quarter of the drawer had been hidden and inside that secret compartment, was a box. It appeared to be made of the same malleable substance that made much of Heaven’s current architecture. In the right angelic hands, it could be formed to whatever was needed, be it stone or glass or, in this case, a box without a seam.

Aziraphale could open it. He felt sure of that much. He felt less sure of whether he  _ should  _ open it. When he held it close he got the same sunshine warm feeling of being near Crowley. He would keep it with him and bask in that feeling until he could hand it over to Crowley when they were reunited. Which they would be. He had to focus on that and be patient.

He patiently went to interdepartmental meetings and patiently did the paperwork that inevitably followed. He patiently explained that, no, he wasn’t interested in any supposed improvements to his corporation and then filled out even more forms. He patiently sat through a lecture on ingesting gross matter. He patiently sat through another lecture when he tried to find a work in the archives that he discovered was stored in Hell. He patiently continued on until finally-  _ finally-  _ the day came when he was issued his corporation and sent back to Earth.

Then Aziraphale decided he had been patient long enough. The moment he set foot on mortal soil once more, he unfurled his wings and set off home. He was beyond the point of caring if it would earn him a reprimand, should a human see him. He tried not to think about how the landscape below had changed in his absence. No matter how much time had passed, he knew Crowley would be out there waiting.

At last, there it was, their little cottage by the coast, still protected by enough wards to keep unnoticed by warring humans and so the same as ever. Within were his books and his bed. There was the smell of apple blossoms that carried on the wind despite the season. And there, wrist deep in dirt was Crowley working the garden. His head was bowed but he looked up when Aziraphale’s wings obscured the sun.

“Aziraphale.” Crowley’s eyes widened to the shape and nearly the size of two disbelieving moons. “Are you here?  _ Are you really here _ ?”

“I—”

Try as he might, Aziraphale couldn’t get the words out. He worried there was something wrong with his new corporation. It looked the same from the outside and had felt the same from the inside but suddenly his heart was beating far too fast and he couldn’t seem to get enough to air in his lungs. He couldn’t keep his wings sorted. He fell out of the air and right into Crowley’s arms.

“Woah, hey, I’ve got you.” Crowley let out a choked sob and pulled him in for a fierce embrace. “You really are here. Fuck, I thought— you know how many times I dreamed this? I couldn’t get any sleep because it hurt too much to see you and have you not be— to know that you really were— But you’re here. Really here.”

He was. He was there with Crowley. He was back home. Warmth blossomed in Aziraphale’s chest and quickly spread throughout his body, settling his upstart organs as it did. Everything felt right again wrapped in Crowley’s arms. He tucked his wings away so he could be encircled by them completely. 

Physical touch after so long without it was overwhelming. He felt altogether too warm and wanted, freshly aware of breath on the skin of his neck, of Crowley’s scent in his nostrils, and muscles that wanted both to squeeze tight and to let go completely. It seemed like he could very well shake apart but everywhere he trembled, there were Crowley’s hands rubbing delicate, soothing circles. Heaven was… well, Heaven, of course. It couldn’t compare. He wouldn’t dare try. But this was another sort of paradise all its own.

A startlingly pitched whine escaped his throat when Crowley finally took a step back. “Are you alright?” Crowley kept a grip on Aziraphale’s shoulders, as if afraid he would crumple if left to stand on his own. “You haven’t stopped shaking this whole time and you still haven’t said anything.”

He looked so worried and Aziraphale hadn’t a clue how to respond. This was all too much and yet not nearly enough, not by a mile. He looked deep into those beloved eyes. Those were perhaps what he’d missed most of all. Not because they were beautiful, though they certainly were at that, but because of the way they looked back at him. They were so full of bald, unflinching adoration. Even when they bickered, those eyes were never cold. They never held scorn or ridicule. Not for him. He could trust in Crowley because of what he saw in those eyes.

“Your hair is so short.”

Crowley blinked owlishly at him and then bent double with laughter. He had to wipe away tears before he could speak. “Over a decade away and that’s the first thing you say to me?”

“Oh dear, has it been so long? It’s difficult to keep track up there.”

“Twelve years, six months, and three days. Or something like that. You know, who’s been counting?”

“Oh.” That number stretched out before Aziraphale like an uncrossable void. It was nothing in the grand scheme of things but to miss so much time over paperwork and trudging bureaucracy? “I’m so sorry.”

His knees gave way and he was forced to use Crowley as support. Crowley walked them both toward the low stone wall that encircled the garden. He propped Aziraphale up against it and then perched on top. Sitting there brought his face down the few inches needed for them to look directly eye to eye. He hooked one long finger under Aziraphale’s chin.

“Nothing to apologize for. I know you’d have been back sooner if you could. Why do you think I slithered right around all that red tape when I wanted to come down here?”

He forced a light tone but Aziraphale could still hear the hurt underneath. He felt it himself. There would be no getting back those years. He could only hope that it had been worth it. He’d never received a full explanation for why he’d needed to be in battle in the first place. It was all in the service of the Great Plan. He had to trust that or he would despair.

He took the hand at his chin and pressed his cheek into the palm. His skin still tingled at the newness of touch. “Well, at any rate, I’m profoundly pleased to be back.”

Crowley let out a small puff of laughter. “And I’m profoundly pleased to have you.” He tugged at the short, messily shorn ends of his hair. “You hate the hair though, don’t you? I can grow it back now, if you want.”

Aziraphale shook his head. He reached up and buried his fingers in loose scarlet waves. It only took a moment to run his hands from scalp to tip. “I certainly don’t hate it and I certainly don’t want you to feel you need to change it for me. I’m sorry I said anything about it. I was just surprised. I’ve never seen it so short.”

Crowley’s eyes fell closed. “Well, good you like it because I may never grow it back out if you keep playing with it like that.”

The way Crowley’s whole body was leaning into the touch, Aziraphale wasn’t especially inclined to stop. “What have you been up to this whole time?”

“You know. Things. Might have stirred up a bit of trouble but thought you might not be happy about that so then I did other things. A fair bit of embroidery. Tried to get better at baking. My bread’s not as good as yours but it’s edible at least.”

“You’ve started eating more, then?”

“Eh, more yeah, but doesn’t mean much. Figured I’d do it in your place a bit. Not sure if I’ll keep it up now you’re back.” Crowley turned his head enough that he was able to catch one of Aziraphale’s wrists with a kiss. “What about you? Do anything interesting up there?”

Aziraphale swallowed a groan before it could escape. He was used to much more but whether it was the time apart or the new corporation, that one light press of lips to skin jumped like a lightning bolt through his arm and right up to his heart. “Nothing— nothing much,” he replied a bit breathlessly. “Oh! I do have something for you. Something of yours.”

“Something… of mine?”

“Yes. I hope you don’t mind that I took it but it’s not like you can. And, well, let me just fetch it.” He dug into the pocket sewn into the inner lining of his cloak and tried to ignore the way his cheeks burned under Crowley’s intense gaze. “Ah, there it is.”

He held out the white box and Crowley took it with trembling hands. “Do you have any idea what this is?”

“I thought it best to let you show me instead of speculating. That is, if you want to show me. It was hidden and I didn’t try to find it but I understand if it’s private.”

“No it’s… it’s fine. You might wanna stand back, though.”

Aziraphale took a step back. “Good?”

“Erm, might want to be further back.”

That seemed ominous. Aziraphale was only just realizing if Crowley had hidden it, it could be some sort of contraband. He hoped it wasn’t anything that would cause either of them trouble. He supposed it was too late, in any case. A vivid blue light bisected the box as the glyph that closed it was undone. The box was eaten by the light and when Aziraphale’s eyes adjusted to the brightness of it, he saw there was a mound of fine, shining powder collected in Crowley’s cupped hands.

“Is that—?”

Crowley’s face was split by an impish, delighted grin. “Yep. Now this is the part you’re going to want to stand back for.”

Those golden eyes which already so reminded Aziraphale of the sun started to truly glow. The powder formed a swirling miasma in the air between Crowley’s outstretched palms. Aziraphale needed to squint out from behind a shielding arm and even then his eyes watered at the brilliance of the light. His heart forgot to beat as, through sheer force of will, Crowley formed a twin pair of stars. They were but an infinitesimal fraction of the true thing, not considerably larger than the pinpricks visible in the night sky, but they were unmistakable for what they were. Despite appearances, there was the distinct impression that they were far larger, that Crowley, too, was larger than his mortal frame should rightly allow. His wings formed a field of stars behind him as they pressed urgently against the fabric of this plane, fighting to come through.

Aziraphale gasped. The sound was enough to shake Crowley from the sort of trance he’d fallen into. “Don’t get too attached to them,” he said, a foreign, rumbling undercurrent to his voice. “I’ve got a plan for these.”

The stars spiralled around each other, closer and closer, until at last they clashed and burst into a miniature supernova. Crowley’s fingers danced around it like he was playing an instrument Aziraphale couldn’t see. Something brilliant was pulled free just before Crowley clapped his hands together.

He smiled sheepishly up at Aziraphale. “You can come back over.”

“Was that stardust? I didn’t think there was any left since, well—” Aziraphale made an expansive gesture.

“‘ _ Let there be light’ _ ?” Crowley offered. “Probably isn’t any left, now. It’s not needed to make the new ones. They sorta do that on their own. But I kept a bit. Little souvenir from Rigil Kentaurus and Toliman, which was one of my favorite projects. Probably why Proxima Centauri ended up a little undersized. Oh well. No one else ever noticed.”

There was a buzzing in Aziraphale’s brain in the approximate location where cogent thought usually occurred. “All this time and you used it up now?”

Crowley shrugged with his hands still held tightly together. “Sort of spur of the moment. Wanted to make you something.”

Aziraphale leaned forward and kissed the bent tip of Crowley’s nose. “It was absolutely stunning.”

“Heh, well, I lucked out and had one of the flashier jobs. But that’s not what that was about.” Crowley unfurled his fingers and produced a small golden snake. No, a ring shaped like a snake coiled in on itself. “While you were gone I got to thinking. About you. About being apart. About how we could maybe be together even when— not that I expect you to get killed again or something. Could be me. Or neither of us. Not really what it’s about. And you don’t have to, if you don’t want. Could just be a ring. You don’t even have to wear it. But if you want to...”

Crowley held out the ring. It nearly fell from his fingers with as much as they were shaking. Aziraphale looked at it. Looked at Crowley. He filtered the words through his brain but it felt very much like his brain had gone supernova itself.

“Are you— is this—” Aziraphale tried to take a few steadying breaths but they were immediately transformed into a rather embarrassing bout of tittering. He bit his lip to make it stop. “Crowley, are you asking me to marry you?”

“It’s nothing. A human thing. Do angels even get married? Can they? Whatever. It’s stupid. If you could forget I—”

Aziraphale shut Crowley up with a crushing kiss. If that wasn’t a clear enough answer, he took the ring and held up his hand so that Crowley could see it when he slipped it onto his finger. “I would love to. There isn’t a single thing that I would enjoy more. I only wish…” He took his old ring from his pinky finger and rolled it between his thumb and forefinger. “It’s not as special but perhaps—”

Crowley snatched the ring and slipped it onto his finger. “S’yours. Can’t think of anything more special.”

“Well then, that’s that.”

“That. Is. That.”

Aziraphale felt like he could fly without even bringing his wings out. What a day. What a glorious, impossible, ineffable day. He realized his face hurt because he was smiling so hard and he was more than happy to let it hurt with the way that smile was reflected back at him on Crowley’s face.

“Should we… see a priest? Or… or something?”

“Nah. Even if they say they’re talking for Her, not like any of them really has authority over us.”

“A fair point. I feel we should do something, all the same.”

He thought about who would possibly have the authority to do such a thing. It was unprecedented, so far as Aziraphale knew. An image drifted through his mind of Gabriel officiating and he felt a tad queasy even imagining it.

“Why not just us?”

Aziraphale raised his eyebrows. “The two of us? Marrying ourselves?”

“Sure. Why not? Never been done before so there’s not really anyone to say we can’t. Or if there is, they haven’t thought to say anything about it so that’s on them. So what do you say? Me. You. Something brand new. Our own sort of… Arrangement.”

Aziraphale hummed thoughtfully. “Yes.” When he said it, he felt sure. It seemed a surer choice than any he’d made thus far in his long existence. “Yes,” he repeated.

“Well then… alright. I, uh… If you’ll take me?”

“I said I would and I do. And you?”

“Yes. Yeah. Course I do.”

They clasped hands as the fabric of the world rippled at the shared words of binding divine command.

“Then, shall we seal it with a kiss?”

The words were barely out of Aziraphale’s mouth when Crowley obliged him. It was a brand new body and so, in a way, a whole new first kiss. Unlike that one in Rome, the stars weren’t above but wrapped around their fingers. For that moment while their lips locked together, all of creation obligingly rewrote itself. Heart fell into sync with heart and lungs drew twin breaths. As gold forged from the clash of stars, they were two bound as one and one they would remain, no matter what the future held.


End file.
